Court of UK rejected Nirav Modi’s plea to prevent his handover to India. Photo Courtesy – India TV
The escapee diamond trader Nirav Modi observed a blow in a legal attempt to prevent his handover to India. He sought permission to appeal against a British court order in London. But the court of UK rejected Nirav Modi’s plea to prevent his handover to India. The 50-year-old businessman has been held at Wandsworth Prison in southwest London since his arrest on March 19, 2019. UK Home Secretary Preeti Patel ordered Nirav Modi’s handover to India in April.
A British High Court judge has ruled out Nirav’s appeal against the decision to hand over him to India in February on a charge of bank fraud and illegal financial transactions.
However, according to the legal guidelines, he will still have the opportunity to make an oral application within 5 working days. Nirav Modi is wanted in India in a Rs 13,500 crore fraud case with Punjab National Bank (PNB). The PNB scandal shook the banking industry all over India.
Mehul Choksi left India in the first week of January 2017, a few weeks before it was announced. Nirav Modi, Mehul Choksi took out letters of undertaking by bribing the officials of the government bank. On the basis of this, they took out loans from foreign banks.
That loan was not repaid. The bankers who helped the two persons did not include the letter of undertaking in PNB’s banking software. As a result of that, the whole fraud was not reported for a long time. As the bank guarantee of Rs 13,500 crore was not paid, the responsibility fell on the bank.
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In February, the district Judge Sam Guzi said in his judgement of the case that the diamond trader would have to answer to an Indian court. The provisions in British law to prevent extradition do not apply to him. The judge further said that there is enough evidence to convict Nirav Modi of conspiracy to defraud PNB.
Coincidentally, on the same day that the Enforcement Directorate (ED) announced that they had handed over part of Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi, and Mehul Choksi’s confiscated property to state-owned banks and centers. Their property worth Rs 18,170.22 crore has been confiscated. Of this, ED has handed over Rs 9371.16 crore to the government.
India is nominated as a Part 2 country regarding the Extradition Act 2003. It denotes that the Cabinet minister has the authority to order a requested person’s extradition or handover after considering all the issues. The order of the Home Secretary seldom goes against the decision of the court as she has to consider very narrow bars to extradition. In the case of Nirav Modi, it does not apply.
The case will now go through the next process i.e. appeal in the High Court. Nirav Modi’s lawyer will appeal for a full hearing against the handover order with a renewed application. There is still some way when Nirav Modi can be shifted from HM Prison Wandsworth in the UK to Arthur Road Jail Barrack 12 in Mumbai and face trial in India.
Shalini Gupta is a teacher at New Delhi with multifarious talents. She has a deep passion for reading, writing, drawing, sketching etc. simultaneously with her teaching job. She is currently writing for Bigumbrella also.
